[Donny Brook]

Centuries ago, an Orc raiding party pillaged the remote enclave of scholars that once nestled in the Snowy Heights Pass. The scholars had long been nuturing a spirit of knowledge in the hopes of growing into a patron god for their order. The orcish shaman accompanying the raiders bottled the spirit into the first thing that came to hand, a sturdy, short section of a pear tree branch, and brought it back to their homeland.

The spirit survives in the stick, which is now known as Charadon's Stick of Wonder. To use the SoW, one need merely hold it and say a question beginning with the phrase "I wonder...". The spirit will then reply to the question, giving a comprehensive recitation of all it knows on the subject. There are drawbacks however. The reply is not interactive, the spirit cannot be interrupted, redirected, or paused until the spirit has spoken its full (sometimes excessive) answer, and follow-up questions do not register as such. The Orc Grand Chief now in possession of the stick has hired a team of scribes to pose questions of the stick and record its responses on a growing library of scrolls.

Next: the Elixir of Suspense